Robot room service in hotels

Relay, a three-foot-tall rolling robot, can make room service deliveries and drop off small items like toothbrushes and phone chargers. The robot requests elevators via Wi-Fi, calls the room ahead of its deliveries and (when it senses the room door has opened) pops open a two-cubic-foot cargo container before departing with R2D2-like electronic happy noises.

This is pretty cool. Though the interface has to be just right. I can see how interacting with these robots could be incredibly frustrating. Like when I’m trying to get Siri to do something.

If I can drive up to a hotel, throw my bags into a robot cart, curbside check-in, and have my bags find their way to my room, like in a matter of 60 seconds, that’s a neat experience. Especially if you’re wrangling a couple of kids.